discourse. if you want to change where we are, we have got to win the argument. margaret thatcher famously put it first you win the argument, then you win the election. and i look forward to working with each of you to do precisely that. thank you. .. >> james patterson discusses his book, "the eve of discussion." it airs at 10 p.m. eastern tonight and again on sunday at 9

p.m. and midnight. those are just a few of the programs we bring you this weekend. visit booktv.org for a complete schedule. >> next on booktv, a presentation of this year's paolucci bagehot book award winner, john fonte, author of "sovereignty or submission." during the dinner mr. fonte delivered a lecture based on his book. it's a little over an hour. [applause] >> thank you, mark. i'm very honored, and it's very flattering to be in such good company in previous winners of the paolucci/bagehot award. it's also a great honor to

receive this from the intercollegiate studies institute which has done wonderful work in sustaining the core principles of american civic life. i also wish to extend condolences to the isa community for the recent loss of a greaptd lady and scholar, ann paolucci. finally, i'd like to acknowledge that henry paolucci was a stalwart defender of american national sovereignty, and i hope that -- he would have been pleased in presenting this award to me, as pleased as i am in receiving this. i'm going to proceed as follows. : first, i'm going to talk a little bit about what i call philadelphia sovereignty. second, i'm going to examine the ideas of the global governance project which challenges philadelphian sovereignty, and third i will move from ideas to action and look at some the actual activities of the globalists. and then, fourth, i will examine

the significance of this conflict between constitutional government and global governance. now, sovereignty is defined by most scholars and most people as westphalian, embodied in the nation-state and going back to the treaty of westphalia, 1648, and that's true to an extent. but when i was working on the book and thinking of writing, coming up with some concepts, i realize that americans don't think of themselves as westphalians. they'll say, oh, we're defending westphalian sovereignty. [laughter] americans think of sovereignty in the sense of we, the people of the united states of america. the opening words of the constitution of the united states written, of course, in philadelphia. hence, i came up with the term philadelphian sovereignty. also, of course, rhymes with westphalian. but what does philadelphia sovereignty mean, of course? the people aren't sovereign but

through a constitution. and the twin pillars are liberty and concept. so we do have -- consent. so we do have majority rule, but it is limited through a constitution, and the whole system of separation of powers, of federalism, of limited government. so this is philadelphia sovereignty. a lot of times people get hung up on are we a republic or a democracy. we're a compound regime, a regime that is both liberal and democratic or constitutional and republican or liberal and republican. you could use any of these terms. alexander hamilton used the term representative democracy. so we're a government that is based on majority rule and consent, but that is limited by a constitution. hence, this compound regime. now, one of the major charges that the american colonists raised against king george iii in the declaration of independence was about sovereignty. i'll read that charge. he, that's george iii, has combined with others to summit us to a jurisdiction -- to

subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation. now, of course, the constitution he was referring to, obviously, in 1776 was the british constitution. the ancient constitution. but they were looking for some foreign jurisdiction that was going to have authority over us. we're going to examine the ideas and practices of those who in our time have combined with others to subject us or to attempt to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution. well, ideas have consequences as we learned long ago from an early isi scholar, richard weaver. so let's examine some of the ideas. let's start with that, of the global governance project. these ideas are not hard to find, you know? you don't have to be invited to a secret conspiracy meeting or a

trilateral commission, any of this stuff. it's right out in the open. up on the web sites of u.n., european union, the american bar association, the deans of most law schools at american universities, leading american foundations, it's all there on the internet. and people are not talking about world government anymore, they're talking about global gore nance -- governance, this form of transnational governance. so let's look at four people, quick views of theirs, who have given ideas about this. strobe talbot is currently the president of the brookings institution, he's former secretary of state and as a journalist for time magazine in the 1990s, talbot wrote an article in which he welcomed supernational political authority. he said, quote: i'll bet that within the next hundred years nationhood as we know it will be obsolete, and all state will recognize a single global

authority. he concluded by saying that this devolution of power upwards toward the supernational and downwards toward autonomous units of administration is basically a positive phenomena. harold coe is currently -- today he's the chief legal adviser of the u.s. state department. in other words, he advises the president on what international law. he's the american spokesman on international law. he was the dean of yale law school. he gave a major speech last week at georgetown law. harold coe wrote, quote: domestic courts must play a major role in coordinating u.s. domestic constitutional rules with the rules of foreign and international law to advance the broader development of a well-functioning international judicial system. well, think about that for a minute.

american courts can't coordinate the law from international law. they won't have much influence over bear national law and foreign law, but they can coordinate american law. that's the influence american courts have. so in other words by definition, if this is true, if we coordinate american law with foreign international law, he would have to subordinate american law to foreign international law. it's the only way this would logically work. the fourth person i'm going to talk about for a minute is anne marie slaughter. she was head of the office of policy and planning -- or the third person -- at the u.s. state department during the first two years of the obama administration. anne marie thought wrote that -- she argued that nation-states should see the degree of sovereignty to what she called transnational networks. vertically, this is a direct quote, nations should cede sovereign authority to supernational institutions such as the international criminal court.

so vertically. there'd be something above the nation, supernational institution. slaughter maintains that such transparent networks, quote -- this is a quote from slaughter: can perform many of the functions of a world government; legislation, administration and adjudication without the forum. thereby creating an effective global rule of law. well, she was the person and policy planning, the key think tank of the state department first two years of the obama administration. but there's also a republican i'm going to mention here, richard haas. he's currently the president of the council on foreign relations, and he was a special assistant to president george h.w. bush, and during the administration of george w. bush, he served as the commissioner of policy and planning, same position as slaughter. he argues that sovereignty is not only becoming weaker in reality, but it needs to become weaker. states should wont a weakened

sovereignty, he says, ford to protect himselfs -- in order to protect themselves. i want to make one thing absolutely cheer clear. i'm not talking against international law in general or against international relations, and i draw a clear distinction between transnationalism and globalism and nationalism. there's nothing wrong with having international treaties. that means between nations. so the united states has a nato treaty. we get together with western europe, we're going to defend ourselfves, there's nothing wrong with that. same thing. i am criticizing in the book supernational, something about the nation-state or transnational, across or think of the transcontinental railway, something across nations, goes within nations. so the term transnational is used, and that's distinguished from international. those are some to have ideas.

let's dig into a weeds a little bit. okay, so what do global laws and global rules mean? people are always saying we need global rules. and what are the twin pillars of liberty and consent? where do they come into all of this? okay, i'll give you one example from national security policy and one example from domestic policy. let's look at the laws of war. the united states is a party to the geneva conventions of 1949. the original geneva conventions, that's the traditional laws of war, they were radically altered in 1977 by the addition of additional protocol i to the geneva conventions. protocol i was supported during negotiations by the third world bloc, the group of 77, the soviet bloc at the time, be swedes, the swiss, many human

rights groups, many ngos -- nongovernmental organizations -- including the international committee of the red cross. protocol i recognized irregular forces, guerrillas and terrorists as operating without uniform and without clear command structures as legitimate combatants. they weren't under the regular geneva conventions. so they changed the rules of war to favor regular forces over conventional forces. i'll give you two examples. under protocol i irregulars and terrorists are permitted to hide this in a civilian population where concealed weapons before an attack. at that point they're considered civilians. then they jump out. at that point they're a legitimate combatant, and the conventional forces can fire at them. then they jump back into the crowd. at that point they're a civilian again, and you cannot pursue them or fire into the crowd. so, obviously, what does this

do? it, obviously, gives the terrorist and irregulars an advantage, but it also, of course, endangers the civilians. so all the civil rights groups who were saying this was a great advance, they're actually bringing civilians into greater danger by some of the rules of protocol i. another rule of protocol i is that it requires, before a bombing raid, you're required to warn civilians in the area that an air attack is coming. you can imagine that in berlin in 1943, requiring the joseph goebbels, you better clear the propaganda ministry because an air attack is on its way. although the israelis, to their regret, did warn people before some attacks, and they received more casualties because of this. now, under the reagan administration, the united states repudiated president carter's signature and said we would not ratify protocol i.

most of the world has. most of western europe, canada, most of our allies, most democracies -- not israel, india and some other countries -- but most countries are due to adhere to protocol i. during the '80s the united states conducted a series of war games, they changed sides and so on and the side that you follow protocol i rules, guess what? they always lost the war game. during the 1990s at amnesty international charged the united nations -- charged the united states air force with serious violations of the laws of war during the bombing campaigns in kosovo and yugoslavia. they brought these charges before a u.n.-sponsored international criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia which uses protocol i, so amnesty international decried the consistent failure to give

effective warning to civilians before bombing. human rights watch complained that the u.s. air force was too concerned with insuring pilot safety. these were american lawyers writing this, complaining about the american air force, too worried about the safety of american service members. so these are the global rules. when people talk about global rules, these are some of the global rules. this is also an example of transnational politics. it's a new type of politics. so these so-called violations of the laws of war were based on protocol #-r. during the current afghan war, also there were american lawyers from human rights watch, amnesty international charging americans with war crimes once again, this time bringing it to the international criminal court which the u.s. is not a member and doesn't recognize and also on the basis of protocol i rules. so when someone says you're following the geneva conventions, you have to know which ones. is it the '9, the traditional --

'49, the traditional rules, or is it the new rules of 1977 which privilege terrorists? so what we just described, what i've just described are transnationallist, some of them americans, waging what we could call lawfare against american liberal democracy. lawfare could be defined as the use or misuse of law for purposes of litigation, harassment, propaganda to achieve an ideological purpose, a political, strategic purpose. what is the purpose of human rights watch, amnesty international? what do they want to achieve? well, they say this in all their literature, they would like to achieve the spectrum i of global -- supremacy of global law over national law. they're doing this for the purpose of establishing global law as superior to american constitutional law and promoting protocol i. okay. that's, that was national security. i'm going the give you one example from domestic politics.

there is a united nations convention for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women. signed by most countries in the world,170 countries in the world have signed it. there are a few countries who have not joined; sudan, syria, the islamic republic of iran and the united states of america. well, harold coe says, what a disgrace. how can the united states be a world leader on women's rights and not sign this treaty? well, let's take a look. what would radification mean? we don't have to guess what ratification means. the american bar association has written a book-length report, 200 pages, explaining exactly what american compliance would mean. the aba report is based on the work of the u.n. monitoring committees. they go to the countries when they ratify the treaty. so when they went to britain or

australia or canada, they wrote a report. what were they telling these countries to do, how would you follow the treaty? well, the aba report opposes thousands of questions, all of them potential lawsuits. the aba claims, first of all, it's not about equality under the law, it's about de facto equality; that is, equality of result, statistical equality. the aba states gender quotas are not voluntary, it creates an obligation for a quota system. so i'm just going to run through a few of these questions from the american bar association on their web site. this is if the united states or any other country joins cdau, what are you supposed to do? what training programs exist to educate judges about cdau's precedence over national law? is there a national mechanism to promote de facto equality? if so, does it promote the use

of temporary special measures in developing policies? can legal professionals initiate lawsuits for the lack of temporary special measures? if so, how many cases have been filed? what were the results? are there quotas, targets or specific goals regarding compliance? if so, what are they? are they being met? does the national machinery track national budgetary expenditures? what percent of money is being spent on women's programs, on social issues, on family programs? what are the results? are there quotas, targets, specifics? etc., etc. do gender quotas exist for increasing the number of women elected to government bodies? are there public education programs conducted by the state to emphasize the importance of balanced representation in all elected bodies? and so on. well, these are the global rules. i condemn they are not universal human rights, they have little to do with equality under the law. there is actually the partisan political positions of western progressives, of the western left. their political agenda come out

as all of a sudden they're universal human rights. when the u.n.-monitoring committee went to france in 2008, they said, okay, you're doing a good job on political parity. you have these quotas, and 50% of all candidates for municipal elections have to be women. that's good. but you don't have 50% of women on corporate boards or in financial institutions, so you have a problem there. so they suggested instituting financial sanctions against companies that did not redress these differences. the u.n. monitoring committee went to germany, 2004. it demanded to know if the federal government had conducted a study on why fathers were not reluctant to use the parental leave. first of all, you have presential leave, that's good. it's a national policy. so germans are doing a good job at that, but there are not many men who are taking advantage of that. why don't you conduct a study and start having a quality of result in the actual family leave process.

okay let's step back for a minute. a common response is, well, so what? u.n. treaty bodies have no enforcement power. the black helicopters are not going to arrive, the u.n. is not going to come out and actually enforce those laws. this is all voluntary. so what's the problem? well, the problem is that the reality is that the powerful american legal elites, including the american bar association and many other groups which is promoting global human rights law -- they say that, they want a global rule of law. they want it to be superior. there's a global rule of law, it has to be superior. the american bar association's cdau assessment tool i've been quoting from, this 200-page book, makes it very clear that if the united states ratifies, there will be hundreds of lawsuits, and it's not just cdau. there are many other human rights treaties; the rights of a

child, there's currently a rights of the disabled currently before the senate as we speak. what senator wants to get up and says i want to give a vote against the rights of the disabled treaty? but it has all these hidden measures and duo thats. so they're really about a political agenda. and it also includes economic and cultural rights and so on. the whole range of human rights treaties that are really about politics and not about human rights. so what's wrong with this is it distorts the constitutional process. it takes a foreign political actor, a u.n.-monitoring committee outside of our constitutional process, it enters our constitutional process, it takes sides within that process. on one side against the other. so you have this foreign body sort of entering constitutional space. that's one problem. a much bigger problem is it aims to shrink the area of democratic decision making at a national

level, the congressional level, democratic -- it shrinks federalism because the federal system is always trumped in any of these human rights treaties. civil society or the business sector and even parental rights or decision making made at the individual, family or even the individual level. all of this is shrunk, or there's an attempt to shrink it by the global governance movement, by what's called the global human rights movement these days. it shrinks liberty and consent. it shrinks liberalism and democracy, it shrinks constitutionalism and republicanism. through treaty monitoring, the forces of governance claim authority over a wide range of issues that free people have traditionally decided for themselves. these issues include budget practices, criminal sentences, law enforcement, school curricula, textbooks, criminal sentences, employment, immigration, border enforcement,

health care, parental leave, discipline of children within the family, government-promoted multilingualism, ethnic and gender composition of government bodies and so on. u.n. human rights treaties exprison sitly -- explicitly address all those issues. so what does this mean? get in my fourth and final point. what is the significance of the global governance movement? well, first of all, this is a major actor in world politics today. it has an ideological base, an idea base and a material base. there's a social base. part of what i call the party of global governance in this book. it certainly includes leaders of major american universities. american law schools in particular. leading ngos; greenpeace, human rights watch, amnesty international. leading foundations; the ford

foundation, the rockefeller foundation. the elites of the european union, the elites of relationship of the united nations. all of these are part of what i would call the global governance movement. it's a powerful political movement. so point one, it's a major actor. point two, there's a conflict going on between global governance and the forces of a democratic/liberal nation-state. this is a political conflict. point three, this means we need to rethink world politics, the narrative of world politics. we think of it today in terms of, well, there's just these nations, maybe some ngos on this chessboard of world politics. well, we have to take the party of global governance and put it on the chessboard of global politics. it's an actor adversarial to american interests and american values, adversarial to a liberal democratic in general, certainly adversarial to nation-states struggling to survive such as

israel. we think in terms of foreign policy categories as liberal internationalism or realism or neoconservativism, but we haven't thought of global politics which is now transnational. if american lawyers are going to international courts to sue -- to try to indict american airmen for war crimes, that's transnational politics. the new face of politics, we need a rethinking of world politics, and we have to recognize that global governance is a player and a hostile player. now, a few points in closing. one thing i want to say is that american -- there's many american transnationallists, and they see america as, they'd like america to lead the way, to sort of adopt the global governance project as their own project and have america share sovereignty. that's the big term in the european union, sharing sovereignty. so sharing sovereignty with others and demonstrate leadership. how? by subordinating itself to supernational legal regime.

whenever someone says america's got to lead globally, that really means subordinate. that really means following global leadership. but those who promote -- americans who promote global governance say this is in our interests, and it's consistent with our values. it's in our interests because we're the strongest power today, but we're not going to always be the strongest power, and china and these other nations are coming up. so what we want to do -- these are these people talking, obviously. what we want to do is establish global rules now so 30 years from the now when we're not as strong, these rules will be in place, the chinese elites and others will have internalized it, they'll be following the global rules, they'll be practicing it, they'll have learned how to practice it, they'll be good global stewards, good global citizens. so at that point when we become weaker, we won't have anything to worry about. anne marie slaughter sort of supports this general line of argument x she says concern and this is a quote from her: what goes around comes around.

principles that could constrain us today may well guarantee our freedom tomorrow. well, the argument that global governance is an american interest is flawed both on pragmatic and principle grounds. first of all, of course, our freedom will not be guaranteed by these global rules or any global institutions will not be guaranteeing your freedom. that will be guaranteed by a military establishment second to none and the will to use it. it's the only thing that will guarantee it. and then, of course, let's say they try this. let's say china says, yes, okay, we'll accept these global rules. china or some other power. why would they stick to these rules 30 or 40 years once they become top dog? yeah, that was fine to sign on when you guys were the number one power, why should e do that anymore? most countries are opportunistic. as circumstances change, they will change, and international laws, rules are a good 30, 40

years in the past will no longer be valid. so things change. so it's naive, in other words, to establish a -- try to establish a stable international order on the utopian premise. because the united states agreed to subordinate its sovereignty to global authority when it was a leading power, that others will do the same at sometime in the future. of course, this also fails on the moral grounds of democratic self-government. we hear a lot of talk about what are the vital interests of the united states. well, the most vital interests of the united states are securing the preservation and perpetuation of democratic self-government, of liberty and our way of life. those are our vital interests. and if we subordinate ourself to global rules, we've already given up our vital interests. so i would argue that to suggest it's in our interests and consistent with our values to

subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, as the declaration of independence put it, would, in effect, be committing democratic suicide. my final chapter in the book is called the suicide of liberal democracy. and you can -- i say suicide because it's unlikely these people are going to achieve the type of global governance regime that they want. they're powerful forces for global government. but there is a realistic system to the world, and they're not going to achieve the type of peace and global regime that they would like. but they certainly can contribute to our downfall by making us either too weak to defend ourselves or by shrinking the liberty at home as we just went through with the cdau regulations. so they can contribute to the suicide of democracy both in security and domestic policy without actually achieving the type of regime that they would achieve. only a little of this in the

european union. europe today, the democratic states in europe have more or less committed suicide. hopefully, they can maybe come back, maybe be resuscitated. but they've given up so farty to the european -- sovereignty to the european union. 60% of laws are not initiated by the venerable house of commons, but in the european commission. they initiate 60-80% of the laws, and this was told to me by the deputy ambassador of the european union in washington. i'm not making this up. so the conflict. between self-governing regime and global governance is going to be with us for a while. it's going -- i'd say it's perennial really, may be with us long after the 20th century has left. because it concerns the oldest issues of politics, going back to plato and aristotle, the questions of who governs and what regime.

in my book i have a chapter discussing some of the history of the global governance strug and what the american founders' views were as they looked back to this, and they had a definite opinion. they were emphatically on the side of independent sovereignty and against transnational governance. they favored david other goliath, the ancient israelites over their imperial foes, cato over caesar, the roman republic over the roman empire, the english republican, algernon sydney, over the british kings. the british parliament over the british monarch and ultimately, of course, american self-governance over autocratic power abroad as the late will mayor kendall noted in the virginia declaration of rights, the founders' view expressed was an emphasis on the greatest right of all, the right of the people to govern themselves. the arguments over

self-governing southernty versus -- sovereignty will continue. someone says sovereignty is obsolete, they're saying that self-government is obsolete. when someone says that the future of the world requires the rules of global governance, they're saying that americans and other people do not have the moral right to govern themselves. my book argues marijuanas do have the -- americans do have the right to govern themselves as to other peoples. it explains why independent self-government of the sovereign liberal/democratic nation-state is preferred to all forms of governance. i'm going to end by simply reading the final chapter in my book, which i go back to quincy, massachusetts. june the 30th, 1826. john adams, elderly and frail, receives a group of visitor in his upstairs library. seated in his favorite armchair, the town leaders of quincy are

organizing a celebration for the upcoming 50th anniversary of the declaration of independence. and they asked quincy's most prominent citizen, john adams -- known throughout the young republic as the atlas of independence -- they asked him for a toast to be read to the sell brants on july the 4th, 1826. and adams replies in two words: independence forever. they asked if he has anything more to say. he says not a word. i have nothing more to say except independence forever. [applause] >> great. okay, questions. [inaudible conversations]

>> in terms of principal actors, the united states seems to be leading the charge in denying the sovereignty to other nations looking at liberal democrats such as hillary clinton and kosovo, serbia and also neo-cons and the invasion of iraq and most recently the leftist globalist, obama, and the invasion of libya. so i'm -- what my question is, here we have the united states denying the sovereignty of other nations and that, i think, is a problem when we have two parties both which essentially are war parties. >> okay. in my book i distinguish between sovereignty in general, which is westphalian sovereignty which

would be the sovereignty say currently of the burmese hundred that or any -- junta or any state, other democratic sovereign states. so i make that distinction. i say that the democratic sovereignty has more greater moral authority than sovereignty in general. so the cases you're referring to are in most cases are overthrowing -- this is, first, they're overthrowing autocratic sovereigntists. this is also a policy question. my book is concerned main by with regime questions -- mainly with regime questions. these are the two types of questions. one is regime. that includes when type of government you have, the form of government goes to, that's what i'm talking about. your regime meaning the form of government, both the culture and the government, and actual politics, what should be our foreign policy in libya be.

is keeping gadhafi in power, is that for or in opposition to american interests. i don't get into those types of issues in the book. those are policy issues. i'm mainly concerned with the regime issues. but to take your point, i am making a distinct between democraticsonty and sovereignty in general, so i guess i don't have an objection to the overthrow of a burmese government. i would have an objection to, as a policy i don't think it would be a good policy necessarily to try to change every country in the world. i'm not advocating that in every sense, in any sense. we can argue about different policies. i'm saying that as a form of government, the liberal democratic nation-state is superior to other forms of government. those other forms of government, one would be global governance, others is an autocratic regime. i talk a little bit about russia and china as autocratic regimes

in the book, and i don't want see any problem with the -- i don't see any problem with the united states pushing those countries if they can, not by force. we could do it or not do it, that's a policy decision. and then, of course, there's radical islam which also is a type of -- would like to establish sharia as the constitutional structure in some countries. so there are different types of political systems, and i'm saying the philadelphia sovereignty is my preferred system. and also i think it's the best system. >> thank you for your presentation. i thought it was excellent. we see this stuff happening all the time, but you've captured it in very vivid, contrasting subjects, sovereignty or submission. and in the u.n. now there are other things being negotiated that would further weaken our sovereignty or cause us to be

sub missive. so i'm wondering what your actions are. when i look at the country, some huge percentage wouldn't even know what you're talking about. then you get into the people in this room who probably do know what you're talking about, and then you've got politicians who don't care, they just want to get elected in two years. and maybe a state department that might understand this but may or may not want us to remain sovereign. so you said you were going to offer some actions or something, i thought. could you do that? >> well, there are. i didn't say that, but i certainly am doing that, and i can talk about that a little bit. that's a good question. yes, there is a -- i do work in washington, and some of it's from some of the think tanks have started a sovereignty caucus, and this is with members of congress. so we have two years ago we started a sovereignty caucus that has about 50 congressmen who

who are members, and there are some senators who are interested. i've worked on speeches for senator kyl and with some other people, and there's -- he's leaving, but the new members of the senate coming are interested in sovereignty. so i think this is getting, this is on the radar screen. that's couple of treaties, there's the u.n. treaty on the law of the sea which would give, there would be a u.n. body that could actually do direct taxes for the first time, actually collect their own money rather than getting money from the member states, they could actually collect money for transactions in the sea. so we've worked with members who are opposing the law of the sea treaty or have questions about it. there's this disabled rights treaty which is another human rights agenda which sounds great which is also a problem. so, yeah, there is activity in congress, people being very aware of this. in fact, the new senator from --

i think he's going to be the new senator from texas, probably will be elected, was the attorney general of texas and was the major figure in the medellin case which is a major case in international law in which the state of texas defied both president bush and the u.s. state department and the u.n. and went ahead and executed a mexican national. he was the attorney general, he's going to be a u.s. senator, senator cruz, probably pretty soon. so there is activity. there is action going on. there's activity in washington. >> i myself would follow up on that a it little bit because in your description of the nature of the global governance movement it was a strongly-elite-based movement. you mentioned presidents of foundations, presidents of universities, of law school, international lawyers, ngos. everybody who works for the e.u.. and the, and so my question

would be a little more specific, what are the, what is the social base for the sovereignty movement? and, particularly, what are the elites in america, for example, that can be mobilized in order to resist and assert a sovereign view? >> right. well, i suppose the social base would be the counterelite in the places such as this, and center-right think tanks, activists, for example, phyllis schlafly was working for the bricker amendment which was probably the first amendment of the sovereigntist movement back in the 1950s which failed by one vote and which was promoted, the main promoter of the bricker amendment in 1955 was the american bar association which was the leading defender of american sovereignty at that time. they were close to senator john bricker of ohio who introduced this amendment. it's fairly complicated, but basically it's that treaties could not trump the constitution

and that any treaty is not self-executing. it wasn't automatically become law, but congress would actually have to pass a law implementing it, and there's various things it says about executive orders. so it would be that -- i've given talks at groups around the country, i guess activists or counteractivists who are or also very interested in american sovereignty on a wide range of issues. there's people who are concerned about agenda 21 and environmental issues and think that there's an overreach by global environmentalists. there's all sorts of -- there's been family-oriented groups who are also concerned. and supporters of israel are concerned about attempts to limit israeli sovereignty. so there's a broad coalition of, i guess, center-right activist groups and maybe counterintellectuals or something who would counter a -- form this social base you're

talking about. i'm glad you mentioned the e.u., i have a whole chapter in the book on the european union, i'm very interested in that. we see what's happening in europe, and there is a pushback in europe. there's political groups in europe that look to reagan and thatcher, the alliance of european conservatives and reformists. i spoke there in may. there's many people who want to return to the days of -- well, use the principles, not return to the days, necessarily, but use the principles of reagan and thatcher and president claus in the czech republic who are pro-american, pro-free enterprise, pro-sovereignty. it doesn't come from the mainstream parties. it doesn't come from angela merkel and the german and french so-called conservatives. but it does come from elements within the british conservatives and elements in central and eastern europe. so there is pushback there. so it's another ray of hope, you might say. >> you didn't use the word "insidious." [laughter]

>> well, you can use it. >> it is an insidious -- >> waiting for you to bring it up. [laughter] >> and the glaring example of why it won't work is europe, the european union, that you just talked about. it isn't working so well, and that's a microcosm. if you can't organize 27 countries that are all on the same continent with what's supposed to be the same civilization, how are you going to reconcile the disparate civilizations? this is just so farfetched that it should not stand the -- >> well, that's what a lot of people say, but the push continues. and you see the response in europe is to double down now. all the elites are saying we need more europe. now we need someone, a european in charge of all the banks. we need a european in charge of all economic policy, all budget

policy, this the what the leaders are saying, we need more europe. even though it doesn't work, the soviet union didn't work, how long did it exist? 1917-991. you can exist 70 or 80 years and not work. that doesn't prevent you from continuing. >> would you comment on any connections that you see between groups that appear to have less concern about protecting national borders and issues of sovereignty? >> i'm not quite, i didn't want quite follow what you mean -- i didn't quite follow what you mean. >> the question is, is there any connection or do you have any thoughts about groups -- >> no, absolutely. in fact, i have a chapter in in this on the book. i wasn't -- >> [inaudible] >> yes, it's the same exact group and people. the american civil liberties union has a political alliance

with mexico, they've actually signed an agreement with mexico to work against the u.s. government and to work against american border enforcement. they have a formal agreement with mexico on how do we get around american border enforcement, what do we do to undermine american sovereignty at the border? so, yeah, this is directly connected. i have a chapter on immigration and the assimilation of immigrants, national identity and civic education and why it's important particularly in this wave of increasing immigration that we have what i call patriotic assimilation as opposed to multiculturalism. a whole section of the book on this. and, yes, it's the very same groups. in fact, there was a u.n. rap tour who happens to be a professor at notre dame, but he's also a mexican national. he was examining american migration policy, came here from the u.n. without the authority of the u.s. government, but he met with the aclu, with human

rights watch, with amnesty international, so, yes, they want to promote global law, they're working with foreign governments. there's a total connection, so you're absolutely right. >> so i think like most of this room i agree with the general sentiment here that losing sovereignty for america to transnational entities is a very dangerous thing. so i'll ask a more theoretical question which is what's so great about the nation-state? it seems like some to have arguments you're advancing -- some of the arguments you're advancing could also be in favor of state sovereignty, against the nation-state or local sovereignty against the states or the nation-state. so what is it that's so special about the nation-state other than the fact that it's what we happen to have? >> yeah, that's a good question. and the founders, of course, that's where i go for my, that's what i start with. they were thinking of the

ancient republics which were city-states, but as madison said in federalist 10, it has to be broader. and, in fact, by having a broader reseem we permit -- regime we permit greater strength for liberty. so i would say in the modern age this is probably the best defense for liberty, doesn't have to be a nation-state exactly. i mean, i think that theoretically catalonia or flanders could probably exist as a nation as long as they separated peacefully and if they established the democratic republic of flanders or catalonia as some people are discussing now or quebec, this could work, could happen. that's not even necessarily theoretical at this point, and i don't know if you'd call that a nation-state or what. but a nation-state doesn't necessarily mean an ethnic nation. but i think in the modern world this is probably the best institution for liberty unless you could come up with a better one. i haven't seen better.

i don't think global governance -- it wouldn't be world government now as we have discussed, but it would be a form of governance in the which there are these structures. there's an international criminal court, or there's an international criminal court, there's a global rule of law which is superior to national law. so i don't see anything superior to that, and i see -- liberty and consent, i'm basing this on the american founders, what do they see as most precious. going back to the declaration of independence and the constitution, our god, our rights come from god. they're divine, and these rights are protected by a form of government. so it could be a smaller form of government. but it would be some form of a state. i think that answered your question. i don't see anything in the modern world that actually has come up with something better than the nation-states. they could be smaller. >> time for about two more questions.

possibly i'll add one. >> your short version as far as what should the -- [inaudible] we actually get from the united nations at this time. it seemed that jeane kirkpatrick to me seemed to look at things the right way. >> yes, i think she did. there's a new book by ken anderson on what u.s. policy toward the u.n. should be. we could do a number of things. one of the best things to do, and john bolton has suggested that, is to make u.n. dues, i'm sorry, u.n. dues voluntary. so we only pay for the things we want. if there's some health project they're involved with that's doing a good job fighting disease, fine, we can fund that.

the human rights council, well, we don't want to fund that. if it's unesco can has accepted the palestinian state to enter as a nonparty member in which human rights council and both of these which are a forum for anti-americanism in which iran plays a major role, we don't want to fund that. so instead of being done 22%, we should move to a voluntary payment for the u.n. i mean, probably some of you may disagree. i don't think we should just say we're leaving, we're walking out. probably not a good political move. it's not necessary. we'll pay for the things we want to pay for. we'll move to a voluntary basis, and then it's not a problem having it as a talking shop, i don't think. and the security council there are some benefits, we do have -- as long as we have the veto in the security council, we have some influence there. we certainly don't want to reform the security council which means ending the veto.

we could put some new members on it, but certainly putting no base and never going to do anything serious, this should all be done by greek powers, cutting back the funding and having them do the few things that they do okay funding, paying for that, that's fine. having them talk, they can talk. but for cutting back and not taking them seriously, all of those things we can do, i don't think a big, dramatic just saying we're out is probably a good thing or would make much sense or really be in our interests. but certainly cutting back and not taking them seriously would be the main thing. >> thanks very much for your talk. going back to the question of europe, there's manager that concerns me a little bit when we talked about why the nation-state. is the choice only between nation-states as they exist right now and global governance? because i can think, for example, from a perspective from

my research, whatever i do, that the problem with the european union is not that european integration is a bad idea, it's precisely because the europeans have not created an actual federal state that europe is in the trouble that it's in. and this is actually an argument for more europe. basically, more europe that they should have started building in 1962. it's a little tougher to do now from '27. but precisely the problem with europe is you have nation-states that wanted somehow the advantages of a larger organization, but they did not want to pay the price for it. so we have what we're facing right now in europe is 1786, that this is the problem when you create an articles of confederation, you have a federal government that doesn't have the strength that it needs. i'm not saying you have to agree with me, i'm sure that a lot of the people that you speak with don't agree. but the problem of we're not simply talking about a choice here between national sovereignty and global governance. aren't there larger sovereignties that could be, that at least theoretically

could be practical and workable and could protect the sovereignty and the prosperity of the people who live in them? >> um, okay, you raise a good point. yes, there could be something between, as you just pointed out. euro-governance, which is not global government, it's something in between. so you could have a regional government of some type. so you could have a euro governance. yes, you could have that. i don't think that would foster liberty or consent, so i disagree with you there. i don't think it's 1786. you have 1786, the people here were american colonists, yes, they were virginians and massachusetts, but they all read the same books. the most common -- there were two books, readings that were common in all the colony, and that was the king james bible and shakespeare. and they were read by all the colonists. there was a demos waiting to be born of people. there's no demos in europe as president klaus says.

what are they talking about now? they have very little -- well, they have no affection for some of the other people, they're tired of paying for this. so this dream is not going to happen. yeah, the elites got some benefits. the european, even the germans got some benefits, some economic benefits for a while, but are they going to have benefits if they keep bailing everybody out? but in terms of consent, in terms of popular consent, no. the british certainly are not -- it's not the house of commons. the house of commons was the mother of parliament, british democracy. this is days of john locke where 68% of the laws are initiated in brussels. so, yeah, you could have this regime. it wouldn't be democratic. it wouldn't be what i call in the book postdemocratic. it may, in fact, exist.

they may come out with some type of europe government. it won't be based on individual rights, but on group rights, so it'll be postliberal, after liberalism. it won't be anti-democratic in the sense that russia or china or burma is today, but it'll be postdemocratic. so you could have it. it wouldn't be a demos, it wouldn't be a government based on consent or liberty, but it could exist for a while. i don't think it would exist forever. >> i'm going to abuse the privilege of the chair and ask the last question. and that is that the, your talk is very illuminating, it casts light on things that aren't often open to public inspection or at least not commonly in our politics. and what seems insidious about the global governance movement is, frankly, it is sort of this it can call elite movement -- technical elite movement which

proceeds without implicating itself too much in the diplomatic processes. so how is it that you structure a politics to oppose it? it seems that it's -- these are things that viscerally generate hostile reaction in everyday americans. and yet they're never brought to americans' attention to get in a snit about. how is it that you packaged this kind of an issue so that you can get a political reaction in america? >> very good point, and that's why i was talking a little bit about the sovereignty caucus. even there, of course, the members are driven by specific issues. so they're interested in general when something comes up, when there's a disabled rights treaty or a law of the sea treaty or something that's going to weaken our sovereignty and cause problems, and they'll react. but you're right, there's not going to be -- it's very hard to organize this in a general way. but you have to look for particular problems. and the other problem as i try to point out with cdau, imagine

testifying against the -- imagine testifying against the disabled treaty or against the women's treaty. a friend of mine testified against it, so one of the senators in favor of it said, okay, these are the countries against cdau, sudan, syria, iran. that's where we want the united states to be. it's hard or to answer someone in ten seconds. you actually have to go to the aba web site and do this and that. so, yes, it's difficult on that score. but as far as to answer your question, i don't think you can organize a general opposition, but you can wait for big items to come up. currently, there's an initiative in philadelphia, a launch by the american bar association to promote the international criminal court and to get the to join the international criminal court. and they're having -- they're paying for members of the court to come here, meet with american judges. they see this as a long-term process. that's the one thing about the globalists. this is a long-term thing. long even after they die. they hope this -- someday this

is a goal that they'll someday reach. and so we should look at that and protecting the american republic. i'm sometimes, sometimes you need to stir people on our side -- our side i mean those who would like to see the american republic survive as long as it possibly can -- they say, well, nothing is forever. so this republic is also not going to last forever. well, i don't know if that's true, because we don't know the future. and i'll stick with john adams. independence forever. as far as i know be, it's going to last forever. i'm going to try to make it that way. >> thank you very much, john. [applause] ..

this guy looked like he could have been the president of the united states. i asked him questions, what is this for? how did you get that? i can hit a deer at 100 yards. he took it for a minute and said what do you do when you get out of high school? i looked at him, eyes and i will play football somewhere. he said that is exactly what i would do because there is no way you will make it in the marines. quickly i realized that is what they're supposed to do. i set myself up. mileage period was over and i

came back for those who don't know me i don't take challenge very easily and i don't take no very easily and if you wanna fly commanders i know that for a fact supply went to my room and started thinking about it and thinking of what the recruiter had done. he had challenged me. i came back to him and left my room and said if you packed your stuff up right now i will sign the papers expecting him to say we can't do today, and i would get out of it. he said all right, let's go. i didn't tell my father. we went to elizabethtown, the papers and the leading standing in my way was my father's signature. we were sitting in my living room war my kitchen table and my dad walks in and he says what have you done now? i said i want to go to the marine corps. he said you were going to play football yesterday. i said i am ready to go. have you really thought about this? yes. an hour drive up there and an hour drive back. i am ready to go.

now i'm enlisted in the marine corps. june 18th, 2006, a date i would never forget. i shipped off to paris island and this is where i would spend my eighteenth birthday. happy birthday. it is not as bad as the next we birthdays because my nineteenth birthday i was in sniper school, my 22 birthday i was in mountain training in bridgecourt, i have a lot of good birthdays. in paris island, shipped to north carolina infantry training and after that went to hawaii where i was stationed the next three years and this is where i attended sniper school. after attending sniper school i shipped to iraq and in iraq i didn't get to complete my floor because i was bitten on my right hand by vicious enemy spider and suffered severe nerve damage but i will let everyone in the room know that the enemy will stop at

nothing. they even train spiders. i turned back home for two years of dismal training and working up to get my hands back and this is why i became a sniper team leader under 500 marines and we were training to go back to iraq. we need five volunteers to go to afghanistan. i said what is the mission? we don't know yet. we just need five volunteers right now. i said i am ready to go. i ended being assigned to a small team and we were going to work as adviser to the afghan national army. it is not like normal missions of going to conventional forces of being around americans or this or that. we live with two marines, one navy corpsman, 80 afghans on base. want to talk about complete culture shock i can tell you i

got one. we did everything from eating to drinking to building volleyball courts to mission planning to hearing their stories of their lives. it helped us become a solid unit and we learned to depend on one another and rely on one another and i want to talk about the afghan later on because of what the current events are but i have to tell you one of the best lessons taught me was not to look at the world, not to judge people by their religion, skin color, financial status or anything like that, but accept them for who they are because i have to tell you i am guilty of having what i said call small town complex. using your world is only this big because that is how you were taught. i am 24 and that is not the case. we always do that. we are so fast to judge one another without getting to know

one another. i definitely think it is something we could listen to. in northeastern afghanistan, right on the back -- pakistan border, this is who i would be stationed with. lt. johnson and dr. lee in. stock way was that navy corpsman but as anybody knows anything about navy corpsman they might as well the marines. i will call him a marine from here on out. [applause] >> part of my opportunity was getting to meet these guys and develop the team because this was a group of guys i call my brothers. when the team was put together the brass picks different skill sets, ranks, throw them in a team, they don't ask about personality or anything like that. they just put you in and expect him to get along.

when i met johnson and we and they were totally different from me. i was the only infantryman in the group. i didn't care about that. i was so excited at the thought of leaving the old afghanistan. it didn't matter to me. what i learn more every day, these guys are the most important people in my life. each of us share responsibility to take care of one another and support one another. didn't take long before personality differences melted away. there was not a doubt they were my brothers and no doubt in my mind that they would sacrifice their life in a moment's notice as i was for them and in this end they proved it. my home team sacrifice their lives not just for me but for all of us. some of you know detail that unfold on september 8, 2009.

we were on a mission, this is the only mission planning they took me out to replace me with a gunnery sergeant named gunnery sgt johnson. he was a big guy, a typical marine, a business grew, loved to work out, i always hated it. he was going to take my spots. for what reason i still ask questions today. my assignment was to sit back and secure a position with all the vehicles and my team entered the valley which i was uncomfortable with but being in the united states marine corps you don't have much of an option but to follow orders. commission was to enter the village and secure a town meeting because village elders had come to saying they were going to renounce taliban. this is how i believe we won the war. i believe by lowering the score of the taliban and by that

stopping the freedom of movement we win the war and stop terrorism. that is what we were trying to do on this mission but almost immediately on entering the village my team was under attack. was an ambush and it was big. didn't take me long to realize it wasn't a normal ambush. i had been in a few firefights in my time but at the first of any firefight is like the dust comes in a new figure out the dust comes in a new figure out in your training kicks in and you start doing your job after 15 minutes but not in this fight. one thing after another. everything started to fall like a house of cards. everything we relied on in every other firefight wasn't happening. our mission was falling like a house of cards. the enemy was seeing it and they were taking full advantage of

it. myself and my driver were sitting in the vehicle and figured out we had to do something. we couldn't sit back and watch anymore. we were requested to go in four times and each time we were told no. we finally looked at each other and said we got to go in because that is what brothers do for one another. we knew as soon as we went on our own program that the situation wasn't as bad as we thought we would have to answer, but i can tell you this i would rather be here answering the consequences for my team being alive today and it not being as bad as was the standing here today knowing i didn't do anything because i was worried about myself and my team be dead. as we were going and i hear lt. johnson over the radio calling in support artillery mission, he starts calling in and with the format, calls it spot on. it is perfect. the response he got back was

good location was too close to the village. he said if you don't give me these rounds we are going to die. the response back was try your best. a few minutes later i hear binary sergeant kenneth over the radio saying he had to call in a medical evacuation. he was trying to get a grip and kept being cut off because of confusion over the radio. with a frustrated police he said get off the radio, trying to get a good for medevac so everyone did. so i plot my sharpie and starting to write if i can write the grid down i tell myself i can locate the position on the map and go straight to him and find where my missing team is. got the first three grids out and stopped and that was the last time i heard from my

teammates. after six hours evacuating afghan soldiers and wounded marines and searching for missing guys a helicopter spied their lifeless bodies in a trench. when i got to the minute they were all gone. i didn't want to face it. it can't be all of them. it can't be true. so i checked each of them for a poll says only confirmed what i already knew. they all felt together doing their jobs they had sworn to do the day they enlisted in the military as every man and woman does when they enlist. they paid the ultimate sacrifice. the details of that they are difficult for me to communicate about i am sure you get the scene now. my actions have been recognized as outstanding and courageous but for me, to be honest, it is the exact opposite. we lived by the word you never leave a fallen marine behind. you get them out alive or you

die trying and if you didn't die trying you didn't try hard enough. i was just doing what my brothers or any other marine would have done for me and an honor by a country and the president of the united states and i stand before you as a medal recipient. >> you can watch that and other programs on booktv.org. >> here are the best-selling hardcover nonfiction books according to the new york times. the list reflects sales for the week of november 12th. below riley and martin to guard recount the assassination of john f. kennedy. and mark cohen's book no easy day, what if mr. bowlen gives his firsthand account of the mission to kill osama bin laden. bill o'reilly and martin to guard make the list again and third with their book killing lincoln and the biography of musician bruce springsteen by peter carlin is fourth followed

by rod stewart's memoir raj. the generals by thomas rigs, a history of american military commanders from world war ii to the presence. novelist danielle steel is seventh with her memoir of a gift of hope. she tells the story of how the loss of her son prompted her to begin working with charity services. , the central talk-show host steven colbert present his plan to get america thriving with his book america again. musician neil young is ninth with his memoir waging a heavy piece followed by a musician peter townshend's memoir who i am at tenth. you can find out more on these bestsellers by going to nytimes.com and clicking on arts. >> booktv continues with diana furchtgott-roth who looks at president obama's green jobs initiative and argues that hur